Lover's Spit
by Zappanale
Summary: The story of how Spike joined the Red Dragon Syndicate with Vicious and how he met Julia, and their eventual seperation at the hands of Vicious.
1. Small Time

_I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion._

**_Jack Kerouac, _**excerpt taken from **_On the Road_**

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It was a rust bucket of a car that Vicious had bought for seventy credits from a Syndicate car guy, one of the last few chop shop people in the whole galaxy. An old American car, spewing dust from it's rotted wheels and smelling of hobo piss and wine. Vicious ran a hand through his hair--more blonde than white back then. Spike sat beside him in the passenger seat smoking a cigarette and playing with the radio.

They had automatic pistols in their laps. Gifts from Mao Yenrai. Syndicate toys.

Spike rolled down his window and tapped ash into the street and then flicked the dead butt out into the gutter, where it hissed and died. Vicious looked at him. Vicious said, "You're nervous." A statement. Just like that.

Spike looked over and shrugged his shoulders under the thin jacket, splaying his hands out in front of him. They weren't shaking. "I look nervous?" he asked. A slow smile spread it's way across his face. Vicious didn't reciprocate. He said, "If you don't want to do this you don't have to. If we do this thing, all the..._small-time_ stuff is done with forever. No more dime store heists or muscle jobs." He said the word 'small-time' with such disdain, like it were bile instead of speech coming out of his mouth. Spike reached into his jacket for another cigarette but there weren't any left.

Both were in their early twenties then. Vicious had just returned from Titan and to Spike he seemed so _cold_ now. Like something had frozen his heart on that desert planet. Up until this point the two of them had done little but robberies and collections for Syndicate crooks. Small-time, like Vicious had said. But then Mao Yenrai comes to them in the pool hall and asks to see them out back, and he gives them guns and an address and says "Kill this man."

You don't say 'no' to Mao Yenrai. It'd be the last word you ever say to anyone.

So now they sit in the front seat of a rusty old car, listening to jazz on the radio. Nothing was showing on Vicious's face: nothing but a weird expression of constant dismay that'd been on his face ever since the homecoming. Spike hadn't asked questions about Titan and Vicious hadn't told any stories. It was an elephant in the room.

"Alright," Vicious said, and opened the door. "No more stalling."

He looked Spike in the eyes. Spike _shivered.

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**Author's Note: I realize this chapter is short, but I wanted to get it posted before the idea left me. If I'm making any mistake with chronology--if Vicious went to Titan after the whole Spike and Julia thing, etc.--please let me know.**

**Thanks, please read and review, and I hope you enjoy.**


	2. Syndicate Boys

**Author's Note: **_Sorry so much _for the lack of updates! I haven't been writing in a while. Thanks to bebopnangel for clearing up the Titan thing for me, I guess I should really watch the show more often blush.

On that note, since I'm much to lazy to calculate exchange rates of Japanese currency--which Woolongs are apparently based on--I'm just going to call money 'credits', and assume that they about equal what an American dollar would nowadays. Hope that doesn't bother anyone. If it does, I guess I could bite the bullet.

Anyway, onto the story! Please enjoy, and please review. Thanks!

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They climbed the steps looking suspicious: thin guys with a lot of hair wearing cheap suits and overcoats. Spike wanted a cigarette, badly. Vicious looked mean. Spike wondered if he could do this: kill a man for money.

The man they were supposed to kill was dealing red eye on Syndicate turf. An offense usually punishable by torture and _then_ death, but the ISSP were cracking down on Syndicate operations and all the torture arists were busy on detectives. The killers, too, which was probably why two hoodlums like Spike and Vicious got hired for this job instead of professionals.

The apartment building was dirty. It made Spike think of his own upbringing in a filthy Mars slum, raised sharing a room with roaches. Poverty drove him to crime. He wasn't sure what drove Vicious. Years later he would realize that it was nothing but evil and sadism.

They reached the door: it was green and chipped and the mold was weak. Spike said, "Should we knock or just kick it in?"

Vicious took out his gun, racked the slide. He knocked. There was a sound like a table falling over and a grunt and then the door opened and the man--tall, black, with a thin moustache and almost no hair, wearing a wife beater and slacks--gaped at them and tried to shut the door. Vicious kicked him in the kneecap and shoved the door ajar and walked inside. Spike walked in beside him.

They raised their guns. The dealer shouted, "I'll stop, oh my fucking God I'll stop! I'll go to Venus! I'll go to Ganymede! I'll deal there! Just do--"

Vicious shot him in the gut. Spike shot him in the chest. Bam bam bam: they emptied their clips.

The dealer's body was swimming in blood by the time they left. Vicious gunned the car away and for the next day or two they laid low in a Syndicate hotel, playing cards, watching TV.

A scary man in a black suit dropped their money off. Ten thousand credits each.

Plus a messenge from Yenrai: "You're Syndicate boys now."

They belonged to him.

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**Author's Note: **Well, there you go. Next chapter should Julia into the mix. I'd appreciate it if a fan could let me know just _how_ Spike and Julia first met: did Spike run into her after being shot a million freaking times and she nursed him back to health, or did they originally meet in poolhall? I remember the flashbacks, just not the chronology. I'm assuming they originally met when she nursed him back to health. Or, at least that would be better for me...more dramatic :)


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